For past 35 years, Washington’s Adas Israel Congregation has hosted an annual program titled “Garden of the Righteous”, each year honoring some individual, group of individuals, who hid or saved Jews during the Nazi years. There is normally a ceremony, followed by the dedication of an inscription on a bronze marker set in an actual garden on the Adas Israel lawn, on the Quebec Street side.

In years past, the Garden of the Righteous program was often held in conjunction with other programming, and the agenda included a role for Adas Israel religious school students to participate. This is no longer the case, and the programs now are generally stand alone programs held typically on a Sunday afternoon. Each program is informative and extraordinarily uplifting, but for whatever reason or reasons, attendance has fallen off. The program this past Sunday, for example, had perhaps 50 attendees in addition to those who had a place on the agenda. Something needs to be done.

Of course, time is running out. The Holocaust ended in 1945, and next year that will be 80 years ago. So while some Jewish survivors, who were young at the time, still live, I would guess that none of the actual rescuers do. So now, the honors generally go to the children and grandchildren of the rescuers, and sometimes to the children and grandchildren of those rescued as well.

This year, the honors went to the van Damme family of Antwerp, Belgium, and the daughter and son-in-law of one of the rescuers came over from Antwerp for the occasion. There was also one of persons saved by their family – a now 95 year old Washington area resident, who was a teenager during the years of World War II. He gave a stirring (if a bit long) account of the story, thanking not only the van Damme family, but also several other Belgian families involved in the rescue.

Hirsch Grunfeld, his parents and younger brother lived in Antwerp, and in 1941 and 1942 were in grave danger as the occupying Germans, with the help of Belgian collaborators, were rounding up Jews and sending them east to extermination camps. Hirsch was 15 at the time, and his brother was 9. Young Alice van Damme girl (who was 22 at the time) witnessed a round-up and decided that she had to do something. What gave her the courage to actually do something, who knows? Those who were involved in hiding Jews or other resistance activities became involved for various reasons, sometimes reasons actually unknown to themselves or surprising themselves. But they put their lives at grave risk (and this is of course not an exaggeration) and went about their business.

Alice van Damme sprang into action, got in contact with the underground in Antwerp, and convinced her extended family to take in and hide Jewish children from two families, the Grunfelds (the parents, and each of their sons being hidden in different places) and another. All of the Grunfelds survived the war.

If you go to this website: https://www.adasisrael.org/garden-of-the-righteous you will see the stories of all 35 honorees, starting with Jan Karski, the famous Polish diplomat who traveled back to Poland and sneaked into Auschwitz in disguise, and then tried to warn the Americans as to what was happening, and running all the way to the van Dammes.

The programs themselves generally go beyond a “thank you” and a presentation by someone who was rescued. This year the program included a very fine talk about a counselor from the Belgian embassy, and a full musical program by soprano Lilly Arbisser and pianist/musicologist Malignan, performing pieces composed by Jewish composers murdered in the Holocaust.

It was a special program, and the fact that a total audience of about 70 (20 of whom were participants) was a shame. The website says that the program was live streamed. I assume this means that a recording will soon be available for you to watch. I suggest you do and that next year, if you are in the vicinity, you attend. You won’t be disappointed.